There is will in the thought, there is none in the dream. The dream, which is completely spontaneous, takes and keeps, even in the gigantic and the ideal, the form of our mind. Nothing springs more directly and more sincerely from the very bottom of our souls than our unreflected and indefinite aspirations towards the splendours of destiny.

There comes an hour when protest no longer suffices; after philosophy there must be action; the strong hand finishes what the idea has sketched.

The mountains, the forest, and the sea, render men savage; they develop the fierce, but yet do not destroy the human.

I dislike wealth and prosperity, especially that of other men.

A strange thing has happened, do you know? I am in darkness. There is a person who, departing, took away the sun.

All the human and animal manure which the world wastes, if returned to the land, instead of being thrown into the sea, would suffice to nourish the world.

Progress is the stride of God.